Home
>
Weight Loss
>
Helping Your Overweight Child

Helping Your Overweight Child

With the rise of obesity and the increasing incidence of type 2 diabetes occurring in children, many parents are now faced with helping an overweight child. This may not be a daunting as first seems and here are some simple, but effective steps to take to help your child develop eating habits and active lifestyle that will assist improve their health.

Be supportive

? Tell your child that he or she is loved, is special, and is important. Children's feelings about themselves often are based on their parents' feelings about them.

? Accept your child at any weight. Children will be more likely to accept and feel good about themselves when their parents accept them.

? Listen to your child's concerns about his or her weight. Overweight children probably know better than anyone else that they have a weight problem. They need support, understanding, and encouragement from parents.

Encourage healthy eating habits

? Buy and serve more fruits and vegetables (fresh, frozen, or canned). Let your child choose them at the store.

? Buy fewer soft drinks and high fat/high calorie snack foods like chips, cookies, and candy. These snacks are OK once in a while, but keep healthy snack foods on hand too and offer them to your child more often.

? Eat breakfast every day. Skipping breakfast can leave your child hungry, tired, and looking for less healthy foods later in the day.

? Plan healthy meals and eat together as a family. Eating together at meal times helps children learn to enjoy a variety of foods.

? Eat fast food less often. When you visit a fast food restaurant, try the healthful options offered.

? Offer your child water or low-fat milk more often than fruit juice. Fruit juice is a healthy choice but is high in calories.

? Do not get discouraged if your child will not eat a new food the first time it is served. Some kids will need to have a new food served to them 10 times or more before they will eat it.

? Try not to use food as a reward when encouraging kids to eat. Promising dessert to a child for eating vegetables, for example, sends the message that vegetables are less valuable than dessert. Kids learn to dislike foods they think are less valuable.

? Start with small servings and let your child ask for more if he or she is still hungry. It is up to you to provide your child with healthy meals and snacks, but your child should be allowed to choose how much food he or she will eat.

Healthy snack foods for your child to try:

o Fresh fruit

o Fruit canned in juice or light syrup

o Small amounts of dried fruits such as raisins, apple rings, or apricots

o Fresh vegetables such as baby carrots, cucumber, zucchini, or tomatoes

o Reduced fat cheese or a small amount of peanut butter on whole-wheat crackers

o Low-fat yogurt with fruit

Foods that are small, round, sticky, or hard to chew, such as raisins, whole grapes, hard vegetables, hard chunks of cheese, nuts, seeds, and popcorn can cause choking in children under age 4. You can still prepare some of these foods for young children, for example, by cutting grapes into small pieces and cooking and cutting up vegetables. Always watch your toddler during meals and snacks.

Encourage daily physical activity

Like adults, kids need daily physical activity. Here are some ways to help your child move every day:

? Set a good example. If your children see that you are physically active and have fun, they are more likely to be active and stay active throughout their lives.

? Encourage your child to join a sports team or class, such as soccer, dance, basketball, or gymnastics at school or at your local community or recreation center.

? Be sensitive to your child's needs. If your child feels uncomfortable participating in activities like sports, help him or her find physical activities that are fun and not embarrassing.

? Be active together as a family. Assign active chores such as making the beds, washing the car, or vacuuming. Plan active outings such as a trip to the zoo or a walk through a local park.

? Because his or her body is not ready yet, do not encourage your pre-adolescent child to participate in adult-style physical activity such as long jogs, using an exercise bike or treadmill, or lifting heavy weights. FUN physical activities are best for kids.

? Kids need a total of about 60 minutes of physical activity a day, but this does not have to be all at one time. Short 10- or even 5-minute bouts of activity throughout the day are just as good. If your children are not used to being active, encourage them to start with what they can do and build up to 60 minutes a day.

Kim Beardsmore is a weight loss consultant. Tons of recipes, articles, free ezine, meal plans and resources to help you lose weight through excellence in nutrition. Estimate your healthy weight, free newsletter and more at http://www.weight-loss-health.com.au

scheduled maid service Morton Grove ...

In The News:

Carolyn Marvin, a 78-year-old retired professor, was arrested after blocking an Uber Eats delivery robot on a Philadelphia sidewalk for months.

The Midnight Mimosa malware campaign hides inside cheap Android phone firmware, giving attackers powerful access before owners even turn devices on.

The Fox News AI Newsletter covers the latest artificial intelligence technology advancements, including the challenges and opportunities AI presents now and for the future.

Meta's Muse AI was built to manage tasks, but users are developing romantic AI relationships and even calling the AI companion their girlfriend.

A Minnesota murder suspect's notebook listed 11 people search websites, raising urgent questions about data broker opt-out and online privacy risks.

Google Universal Cart tracks price drops, surfaces promo codes and uses Google Wallet to match your best credit card rewards before checkout.

Safari's Notify Me feature and Google's price-tracking tools can monitor products and send alerts when prices drop on your iPhone or Android.

George Weiner built PACspam.org to trace who sends nonstop political fundraising texts after blocking numbers repeatedly failed to stop the messages.

A dedicated VPN IP address may reduce frustrating CAPTCHAs and bank login security checks by giving websites a consistent connection to recognize.

Apple Wallet in iOS 27 lets you create digital passes from physical cards using a photo or screenshot, but not every card in your wallet qualifies.

Anthropic's Claude AI submitted a fabricated eyewitness tip about an unsolved murder to a Philadelphia police website during automated testing.

P7 DarkSword iPhone spyware can steal saved passwords, photos, Apple Notes and cryptocurrency wallet data by checking for commands every 15 seconds.

Cybersecurity experts told Fox News Digital that a cyberattack on French supermarket freezers should warn the U.S. about critical infrastructure gaps.

The Oracle Health breach exposed medical records, Social Security numbers and diagnoses of nearly 20 million patients across multiple states.

The new Tesla Roadster drove upside down and launched into the air at SpaceX's Texas facility, but a 2028 production target remains unconfirmed.

Apple's iOS 27 lets you add keywords to iPhone photos, while Samsung Gallery tags and Google Photos search offer similar organization tools.

A fake Claude AI download scam uses Google ads, and Bing redirects to trick Mac users into pasting a hidden malicious command in their Terminal.

Ahold Delhaize's cybersecurity incident knocked online ordering and digital coupons offline at Stop & Shop, Food Lion, Hannaford and Giant Food stores.

The Fox News AI Newsletter covers the latest artificial intelligence technology advancements, including the challenges and opportunities AI presents now and for the future.

Amazon's About You feature includes personality details from your shopping history, and some shoppers are finding hilariously awkward results.

Identity theft recovery starts with securing bank accounts, freezing credit and enabling two-factor authentication within the first 24 hours.

Apple's $299 HomeView smart display uses facial recognition to personalize screens for up to six household members and show live security camera feeds.

Domonique DuBose spotted red flags when a man on Hinge with 85,000 followers and a blue checkmark claimed to be a San Francisco 49ers player.

Your phone's location data can expose visits to doctors, pharmacies and places of worship. The FTC took action against data brokers selling this data.

Hackers targeted Danfoss refrigerator controls across French supermarkets, forcing chains like Carrefour and Monoprix to discard massive food stocks.

Helping Your Overweight Child

Weight Loss